


Axe and Blade

by Lentrax



Category: Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types
Genre: Abuse, F/F, Parallel Universes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:15:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 8,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25502728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lentrax/pseuds/Lentrax
Summary: Heather Harrington, eldest child of the Harrington Estate, has a great deal to live up to. But her talents lay along a far different path than the one her family has chosen.Suki Kurigawa is the singer and lead guitar for her band, Valkyrie. But something has been missing from her life, without ever knowing what it was.Fate is bringing them together, but will they be able to find their way?
Kudos: 1





	1. State of the Estate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> CW: Rape.

**Heather**

The sword clattered as it skittered across the stone floor.

Shortly afterward, a figure in armor followed it. With a grunt of pain, the armored individual slides to a halt.

"Get up."

The voice is hard, it is not a request, but an order.

"Get up, Heather. You are not finished yet. You are not even close to finishing the hour."

Already breathing heavily, Heather was wearing out. This was her third hour of training today. And after she was done with this hour, she would have just enough of a break to get her breath back and have dinner before she was put back in her armor and forced into another hour of "sparring" with her father, the Lord Harrington, ruler of the Benelain province of the Kingdom of Celes. And knowing her father, the last hour of the day would be the hardest of them all.

"Get up, Heather. The longer you stay down there, the harder I will make this for you."

With an effort, Heather started pushing herself to her feet, but before she could get up off her knees, her father's booted foot kicked her back down.

Hard.

Heather fell back with a squeak. Her armor clanked and she felt the air leave her lungs with a _whoosh_ as her armor clattered on the floor once more.

"Faster! You think your enemy will give you time to rise to your feet when you are in combat? Stupid girl, if you weren't my own flesh, I would strip you of your armor and send you away. But you are what your mother gave me, and I will not have it be weak. Now... Get. Up."

And so it went for the rest of the hour. No matter how Heather tried, no matter how fast she moved, no matter how well or poorly she managed to try and fight back, it was not enough. It never was. Her fater would never allow her to be seen as acceptable. No matter how muscled she became, no matter how well she learned to carry a sword, no matter how much she tried...

_Not good enough. I will never be good enough..._

A servant rang the gong, signalling the end of the hour. With one last attack, Lord Harrington bashed the chest of Heather's armor in with the pommel of his sword, cracking the armor under the ferocity of the attack and sending her to start crashing to the ground. Again. But instead of letting her simply fall, Lord Harrington crouched, spinning as he did so, and with an outstretched leg, swept Heather's feet out from under her. What would have already been painful and humiliating was now humiliating, painful, and enough to draw yet more scorn from her assembled family. Her siblings, who long ago passed her in skill and ability, claim that sparring with her was an embarrassment and refused to train with her anymore. With a scoff of dissapointment, Lord Harrington strolled out of the chamber, as though the sight of his daughter being sprawled on the floor of the room where a normal occurrence.

Which, of course, it was.

Her mother, with a casual gesture of her hand, had servants haul Heather up to her feet, and begin the process of removing Heather's armor. With each piece of armor removed, the form beneath the armor is revealed.

Long slender legs and full hips appear as the plate and padding are removed from her figure. Her arms had, over the course of years of training gained a decent amount of muscle mass and are incredibly lean, the definition causing every muscle in her arms to gleam with reflected light off her sweaty skin. The plate covering her chest is removed, revealing a massive bust, heaving from heavy training. The sticky gambeson is peeled away, exposing a white shift, stained red with blood from where her father's last attack broke her armor. Another attendant comes forward with water and bandages, the items already been known to be needed. But at a sharp word from Lady Harrington, the servant bowed and retreated. With steps accented by the heels of her boots, the Lady Harrington was at her daughter's side in four strides.

Heather was bowed over, her hands on her knees, her dark brown hair, in a messy disarray and shiny with sweat, dangling down to the floor. And so it was that she did not see her mother draw her fan and use the ivory stick to lift Heather's face up until it was pressing under her chin, the edge sharp enough for Heather to feel her skin give way to the fan. Heather stood on her toes with her chin up looking into her mother's face, not daring to sag even an inch with the fan pressed into her chin as it was.

"You are a Harrington," the Lady Harington said with a voice cold enough to make ice feel a chill. And also with a edge sharp enough to cut steel as easily as her fan was cutting Heather's chin.

"You will be a Harrington. And we will make you into a Harrington. I do not care how you get there, but you will get to the study. Do you understand?"

Not daring to nod, Heather forced the words out of her throat, her voice barely more than a croak from the screaming, crying and sobbing as her father used her for weapon practice for the last hour.

"Yes, Mother."

The fan snapped out from under Heather's chin, and the teenaged girl collapsed back onto her feet.

"Now, Heather."

"Yes, Mother."

And so, blood still soaking into her shift, Heather practically ran through the halls of the Harrington Estates, her bare feet snagging on the stones that made the floor and tripping her. By the time she reached the study, her knees, shins, elbows and forearms were scraped and bloody, and the blood from the cut on her chest had soaked the entire front of her shift, and red rivulets ran down her thighs from where the blood started dripping from the stained cloth.

Heather burst through the door, and was just starting to slow down to try and catch her breath before her mother arrived, when she ran into something that wasn't supposed to be there. Her speed was still high enough that she bounced off of this strange thing and landed flat on her ass.

Looking up to see what she ran into, she saw a figure in deep violet robes, the hood pulled up around the wearer's face cast a shadow so deep that Heather could not see the face of the one wearing the robes.

The hooded figure looked down at the mostly naked and bleeding girl, and then with a voice that sent chills down Heather's spine the figure spoke.

"Are you prepared to die today, Heather Harrington?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy this! I will be getting chapters out as I get them written, Hopefully we get at least two a week, but depending on my schedule, that may not always happen.


	2. Wings of Despair

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: abuse.

**Heather**

"Are you prepared to die this day, Heather Harrington?"

_He... he knows my name... How...?_

"B-b-... Who... who are..."

"Who am I?" The hooded figure asks. "I am one who watches for those like you. Who watches and waits for the signs, and then acts upon them."

"Signs?"

"Ripples of power. Those who are able to wield the power of the Art."

Heather, still out of breath from her run, could only gape at the figure.

"I am sure you would like to say something about how you don't know what I am talking about, or that you don't have any power. But I have felt the whispers. You have the capacity to learn. To bend magic to your will."

At this point, the sound off footsteps began to echo down the hall.

"Y- you have to go," Heather gasped out. "If my mother finds you here, she will summon the guards and kill you."

"She can try, but I will acquiesce. Besides. I came only to tell you that I have left you something. You will find it, and use it. But be warned, the directions must be followed exactly. Deviation of any kind could be disastrous. I will know if you fail. And you would not like what happens if you do. So I ask again. Are you prepared to die this day?"

Heather looked behind her to make sure her mother hadn't arrived yet. Then she turned back to the hooded figure. "I will try. Now go. Please?"

"Heather Harrington! You had best be in the study! Or you know what will happen."

Heather did know what would happen if her mother got here before she did. And she is glad that she managed to get here first. She looked back to the door to see how much time she had. "You need to go."

She turns back to the mysterious figure to find...

Nothing. The figure is gone. Heather is standing there, mouth agape, when she feels the first lash across her back.

"Heather. You have been addressed by the lady of the household. Speak."

The lash brought Heather's mind back to where she was. And she curtsied.

"Thank you for recognizing one as lowly as I, Lady Harrington. I am your humble servant. In what way can I serve you today?"

Lady Harrington spoke again, her hand tapping a thin wooden switch against her leg. "Very good, Heather. But next time do not make me remind you. A lady never should be reminded that she exists to serve."

"Yes, Mo- Lady Harrington."

The Lady Harrington _tsked_. "A slip of the tongue, Heather?"

The switch whistled as it whipped around, biting into Heather's poorly protected flesh. _Smack!_ Heather yelped as it bit into her skin.

And so it went for an hour. Heather's mother training her in the 'art' of being a sophisticated lady, and Heather trying to avoid being whipped. She was about as successful at that as she was at fending off her father. And during her lady training, her mother took great delight at using the switch where she had already been bruised from training with Lord Harrington. But nothing seemed to give her as much pleasure at the screams Heather cried out when the switch struck the cut on Heather's chest.

By the end of the evening, when Heather was finally allowed to crawl back to her rooms, her torn and tattered shift barely clinging to her bosom, Heather collapsed on the floor, groaning in a mix of pain and relief at the feel of the cool stones on her inflamed flesh. 

She laid there for a long time, not even she was sure of how long. But eventually the stones no longer provided relief and so she pulled herself up and went over to her private bath chamber. It was already full, and she knew just who to thank as she slowly submerged herself into the still warm bathwater. And she did just that as a moan escaped her lips.

"Ohhh, Jenna, what would I do without you...?"

"You probably would have died by now."

The voice caused Heather to shriek as she lurched up and out of the water, hands moving to try and cover what little she could.

"Jumpy today, aren't you?" Heather turned her head to see Jenna standing there, a stiff scrubbing brush and ointment sitting on a table beside thick towels. She helped Heather sit up on the edge of the massive bronze tub.

"My god, Heather... What in the nine hells did they do to you today?

Heather winced as Jenna began plying the brush and soap to the welts laced across her back. But the pain was just a dull ache compared to the receiving of the wounds. And soon enough, Jenna had Heather out of the tub and wrapped in towels. Jenna brings her friend over to the bed and sets Heather down so she can start spreading the ointment, tinged with alm, lavender, and a few other medicines. Heather moans in relief as Jenna begins working the cream into her wounds. And then Heather moaned again as Jenna's... capable... hands, begin massaging parts of Heather that are not sore.

_What few of those there are..._

The massage turned into something... more, and Heather's moans changed to something more pleasurable, and she forgot all about looking for what the mysterious figure said earlier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed it!
> 
> I promise it isn't all gloom and doom. We will get to the good parts.
> 
> Eventually.
> 
> Maybe.


	3. Maid for Each Other

**Heather**

Heather awoke to tangled sheets, messy hair, an empty bed and... Heather winced as she tried stretching and found herself unable to move her arms.

She winced as she saw the torn sheets that still held her arms in place. And with that came the beginnings of a panic attack. She had to get out of bed, so that she could get to her morning routine. If she was late, her training would be...

She shuddered as she thought about it. But no sooner had she started her little panic attack, Jenna appeared. Her maid uniform tailored to her lithe form caused another ripple to go down Heather’s spine, but not one of panic. Setting down the tray with Hearher’s breakfast, Jenna _tsked_ softly.

“Now, now, my lady. It isn’t proper for you to still be in bed. You need to get up and dressed. Your father will be expecting you in the sparring room soon. Now get up so I can help you dress.”

“I would love to, Jenna, but...” Jeather raised one of her wrists up to show her still intact bonds.

Jenna blushes slightly. “Oh, I must have forgotten about those while I was sleeping.”

She quickly hurried over to undo the knots holding Heather to the bedposts. “Oh, and there is one more thing. I found a scroll on your desk this morning. I brought it in with your breakfast.”

Heather followed Jenna’s hand as the maid featured back to the tray. Immediately, the mysterious figure came back to Heather’s mind, and another panic attack started coming over her, but she quashed it. Slipping on a robe, Heather went to the tray and broke the purple seal on the scroll, noting the signet pressed into the wax, a raven with twinned lightning bolts flanking it.

Unrolling the scroll, Heather read the contents. There honestly was not much to it. A list of components, instructions on how to combine them, and where to place them in a magic circle. There was also an intricate design that she would have to draw with sand, along with notes on the order the lines and symbols must be drawn in.

The mysterious figure was right about one thing. Heather has been dabbling in magic for a little over a year now, ever since she had first discovered her talent for it. And since her parents found out about her experimentations, a month later, they increased her training to mold her in what they deemed proper and to quash her burgeoning talent, she was sure.

Since then, she had to keep her experiments secret. Practicing on nights her training had not left her too beaten down to move more than enough to fall into her bed. Nights where she was able to still use her arms and hands to make spellforms.

But this....

This was more complicated than anything she had attempted before. But the notes and the words the figure had used made her sure she could attempt the spell and not die if something went awry.

Moving over to her desk, she pulled out ink, parchment and a pen. She wrote out a list of things from the scroll that she did not have, along with a note at the bottom expressing her pleasure from last night, and thanking Jenna for being the only thing in the world that she loves.

She sanded the note to dry the ink, folded it, and handed it to Jenna.

“A note to your beloved prince, my lady?” Jenna asked with a coy smile, and more than a hint of mock innocence in her voice.

“Better,” Heather said, kissing the top of her maid’s head. “A shopping list. I need these things from the town. Think you can get them for me?”

Jenna unfolded the list and read over the items on it.

“Of course. The old mage on the outskirts should have all of this. And some of it I can get from other places to not draw too much attention to myself.”

“Good! Here,” and Heather handed over a small purse, the coins inside it clinking as they shifted in the leather pouch. “Oh, and I think green today.”

“Green? But you look much better in the light blue.” 

“You’ve done too much blue, Jenna. Choose a different color.”

Jenna sighed. “Alright. Not blue. But not green either! I think it would look hideous on you.”

“Fine,” Heather said little a little giggle. “Not green. Now go on. I have a long day ahead of me, trying to make sure my arms still work.”

“Yes. Please make sure your arms are working tonight. I would hate to have to tie you down again so you don’t hurt yourself more than your family does already.”

“... yeah.”

* * *

Heathers arms, though not unhurt, were still quite usable that evening. But breathing was difficult, after her brother decided to ‘help’ train her to get up more quickly by kicking her hard in the ribs.

But she was not about to let that stop her from attempting this spell.

With all the components ready, those that needed to be heated sitting over candles, Heather removed her clothes and got to work.


	4. Remember This Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is finally done.
> 
> Enjoy. And i will be working on getting the next chapter up on Monday.

**Suki**

The second set of speakers blew out with a shower of sparks, and a young woman with jet black hair streaked with green shouted a curse as they singed her arm, her bass swinging wildly on its strap as she furiously patted her arms.

"Damn these cheap pieces of _shit!_ Why the hell did we opt for these demons again?"

Another girl just a little further away on the stage sighed as she lifted her guitar off over her shoulders. The strap grabs hold of one of her twin braids, lifting the blue, purple and black hair up until gravity pulled the braid back out of the strap to fall past her shoulder again.

“Because, Hazel,” she said, “it was the best we could afford with the money we have.”

“Yeah,” the girl at the drums said, setting her sticks down on the set in front of her. “But you’re rich, aren’t you, Suki? All that money from your time as an idol in Japan?”

Suki sighed. She has been through all this with them a hundred times. A million, maybe.

“Yeah, Bianca. I’ve got money. But I can’t access it until I’m twenty-one. Remember? You were all with me when I was asking my lawyer if we could get some of it to help fund our band. And the answer was no.”

The fourth girl sighed this time. “We know, Suki. And we know you tried. That’s why we don’t resent you for holding out on us. We’ll just have to do it on our own, the old fashioned way. One gig at a time. But at least we still have the speakers for the show tonight. Plus, the ones we can borrow from the headliners."

"That's right! We've still got our show gear, and Dan is a fan of mine from my work in Japan," Suki said. "Which means we have more than enough to blow everyone away. And we will too, if the couple of shows we did so far are anything to go by, so c'mon, let's go get our stuff loaded and over to the arena so we can get it backstage and ready to go, and then we can nail down the setlist. We only get five, maybe six songs before Dan and his boys will be ready to go."

The girls grabbed their instruments, Bianca having a little trouble getting her drums to all fit in the van her parents were letting them borrow. But finally they fit everything in the minivan, and were on their way to the arena, cellphones on speaker so they could talk about potential setlists as they drove. Pulling off the freeway to get to the arena they were still arguing whether they wanted to include "My Steel, My Bond," when they pulled up to the service entrance to unload their gear. They started getting everything out and onto a cart to push inside and toward the stage. Once inside, they started getting everything plugged in, and set up. Valkyrie is not yet popular or successful enough to have sound or stage engineers, so Wenona pulls out her laptop and plugs it into the system, to set up the equipment for their set.

"All right, girls," Wenona says from over the top of her laptop. "We got everything ready, but I need to know the final list so I can program it all in the right order. So, what are we going with?"

"List three," Suki says. I think it is the only one we can do that wraps up in the tie we have, and shows off all our talent."

"List three.... Got it! So we're going with "Ride," "Fallen," :Steel," "Hall," "Berserk," "and "Valley." Anything else?"

"No," Suki says. "That is it. We'll all get a chance to shine, so, let's get ready. We've got a little over an hour, and then it will be time to go on. So, let's get dressed, get warmed up, and get ready for tonight!"

An hour later, and they can hear the noise coming from the audience. This is the biggest crowd they've ever played for, and Suki understands that they aren't strictly here for them. But this is the best chance they will have to get in front of a massive group of people for a while, so they have to make the most of it. Suki is on stage, behind the backdrop, taking in the noise. 

"Suki? Hazel is freaking out. Wanna help calm her down?"

Suki turns to Bianca, and sighs. "Yeah. We better talk to her. Where is she?"

"Back in our dressing room."

Suki follows Bianca backstage, and down a hall to a small room with a paper taped to the door with the name "Valkree" scribbled on it. Pushing open the door, Suki first spots Wenona standing next to a stack of crates, with one foot up on the lowest crate so she can keep her leg straight as she zips her boot up. Suki apparently walked in in the middle of Wenona trying to talk to Hazel, because at the same time she spots Hazel, she hears Hazel responding to something Wenona said. "But what if I freeze up? What if I choke and screw up our rhythm?"

"You won't," Suki says. At the sound of Suki's voice, Hazel, who must have sitting on the floor by the crates, startles and bumps the crates, forcing Wenona to struggle to keep her balance for a moment. Bianca reaches out a hand and helps her, with Wenona giving the drummer a grateful look.

"Suki. seriously, you have to let me leave. I'm no good. I'm going to go out there, and i am going to screw everything up for-"

"No you aren't," Suki says, cutting over Hazel's fear. "You have been amazing every step of the way. When I put the call out for folks to try out for the band, I didn't even have a clue what we ere going to be doing. I had no theme, no concept. I didn't even have any music written. The stuff I gave you guys to try out was repurposed music from my pop idol days. But you nailed it. All of you did. We did our first show for the school, and you nailed it. We nailed our demo tape. Couldn't have done that without you, We played some small gigs, did the local rock tour. You were amazing. We would not be Valkyrie without you Hazel. Without you we would have someone else, and we would not sound the same. You are Valkyrie. You deserve to be here, and you have earned your spot in this band. You are-"

But whatever Suki was about to say was interrupted by a knock on the door.

"Valkyrie? You're on in ten."

"On our way!" Suki called out. She held out a hand for Hazel. "Alright, girls. Time to rock. Let's make this a night to remember for the crowd out there."

Hazel took the hand, and Suki hauled her up to her feet.

* * *

The girls were sitting in a booth in a Denny's. The mood was definitely subdued. Part of it was fatigue from playing even the short setlist they did. But the other...

"So..." Wenona started. "That could have gone better."

Suki sighed heavily, almost huffing it out. "Yeeeah. It could have. But there is not much we can do about it now. We just have to take what happened and learn from it so we can do better at our next show."

'Take what happened?" Bianca practically shouted. "How are we supposed to learn from all of our equipment shorting out? Again?"

"I know," Suki said. "I know that that is what happened. But at least we got through most of our set before it happened. So that's, you know, _something_."

"Yeah," Wenona said. "All we can do is try and replace our gear and keep going, right? So how about it girls? Ready to head home?"

There was a general murmur of agreement, and they paid the bill and headed outside to start heading home. As they walked through the parking lot, the streetlamps providing illumination began to flicker, and a very odd mist began to rise from out of nowhere.

As the lights continued to flicker, gusts of wind started picking up random bits of detritus from the ground. Newspaper clings to the girls' legs as they start looking around at the oddities happening.

"What the fuck is going on?" Wenona asks, a slight tremor in her voice.

And as though the Universe decided to answer the question, a bright light winks into existence over their heads, a bright, deep purple pattern of light, carving sigils in the air.

It is Wenona who recovers enough first to exclaim, "What the..."


	5. Tonight We Fly

**Heather**

With the last of the elements in place, Heather removed her robe. Drawing lines for a spell required skill and precision, and the fabric from the robe would cause her to fall over and ruin the line. One line drawn out of place or in the wrong order would cause the spell to fail. And if it fell badly... Well, at least if that happened, she would never have to worry about disappointing her family again. But she really wanted this to work correctly. If she had figured out anything from the directions the mysterious figure had given her, this spell was supposed to teleport her somewhere. Likely the keep of whoever it was who visited her earlier today.

Heather could only hope. It was her chance to maybe escape, to find herself, to be who she truly was.

Thunder boomed across an empty sky.

Her hand paused after finishing the line.

_Boom._

Unless her mysterious benefactor was worse. But she did not, could not imagine, really, how that could be.

Besides.

It had to be better than here.

Anywhere had to be better than here. 

Her hand moved to the next position and began to draw. a long line that took her from her position in the center across the circle, almost bissecting it, until it curved near the bottom and began to draw back up toward a complicated intersection in the first quadrant.

_Boom._

As she finished the line, she took her silver knife and pressed into her palm. With everything she has been put through, she barely felt the prick of her knife blade as she drew her blood to empower the lines. A drop of blood and the candles flicker as unseen power awakens in the room.

Thunder booms from the distance as she continues to work. The storm announcing the true beginning of spring. Heather idly wonders if the flowers will bloom early, but focuses on the work before her. 

Turning to her right, Heather picks up the sand and begins drawing again. At last, she is drawing the last line. She speaks the words of the spell again as she draws, feeling the power flow through the air and into the form on the ground before her. The lights continue to flicker. The pattern she has completed is the most powerful and complicated form she had ever attempted, but at last, she is drawing the last line.

_Boom._

She starts speaking the incantation. And there is another boom. Not from outside. But from her door.

"Heather! I know what you are doing! Stop it now! You stupid girl!" Each sentence is puncuated by another crash, as Lord Harrington attempted to break down Heather's door.

At her father's voice, she jumped, the flow of syllables from her lips slowing. But she doesn't stop. She can't stop. Stopping can lead to terrible consequences.

She flicks her knife again and another drop of blood seals the circle. She continues to speak.

_Boom._

_Crash._

"You stop this right now, or so help me, by the gods, I will _break_ you!"

The Lord Harrington entered Heather's room, where she stood naked, her broken, bruised, and bleeding body on full display. But if her father had any shame for seeing his eldest child in her state, none of it showed through the blind rage on his face.

"You stupid child! You have no magic! This madness ends tonight!"

The Lord Harrington picked up the bag of sand sitting where Heather left it. Taking a handful of the sand, he threw it out across the circle on the ground. Heather had enough time to throw her hand out to try and stop him. The sand landed across the circle, drawing a new line just as Heather finished speaking.

The sand began to glow, at first an amber glow, but it quickly shifted to an angry red. The sand writhed on the floor, the delicate pattern Heather had drawn beginning to rotate. as it spun, the lines spiraled out, casting long shadows across the room.

But Heather's father, the Lord Arlent Harrington, was not finished. In his need to finish the disruption of Heather's spellform, he threw his bared sword at his daughter. The light reacted to the metal, shifting colors again, flashing through the rainbow. Runes began to write themselves in the air.

Heather screamed.

The colors swirled and flashed. Arlent Harrington raised his hand to shield his eyes from the brightness of the light.

The colors flashed through a coruscating rainbow, and Heather screamed again. Then the colors faded, and the light in the chamber returned to normal.

Heather was gone.

**Suki**

"-hell?" Wenona shouted, as the runes and sigils in the air pulsated, and continued to draw themselves in the air outside the Denny's.

But before any of the other girls could even think of a response, the purple began to shift and pulsate in different colors and started to spin. The light grew bright, and the four girls raised their hands to shield their eyes from the bright lights.

Then they heard the scream. A girl screaming. Not afraid. Not really. But a pain scream. A scream of something horrible happening.

The scream was getting louder, and seemed to be coming form the light. And then several things happened all at once. 

The light vanished, winking out so suddenly, it was as if it was never there.

Suki cried out in pain.

Something clattered across the parking lot.

And a naked girl had appeared out of nowhere and was currently laying on top of Suki.

"What. The. Fuck." Wenona said. Apparently, this was the only thing any of the three girls, frozen in their tracks, could think to say at the scene unfolding before them.

Hazel, having put some of what the scene in front of them was about, sighed.

'Why can't it ever rain women on me?"


	6. A Whole New World

Heather was on top of something. Something soft, yet firm at the same time. She was breathing heavily, but it looked like, at least for now, the spell was over. And wherever this was, it was not her home. Where she was, she couldn't say because she didn't want to open her eyes to see that she had gone nowhere and she really was the failure her parents kept making her out to be. She really did not want to open her eyes to that.

So she kept them shut. Shut tight, refusing to open them.

Something moved beneath her, and she shrieked in surprise as a hand pushed her on her bare stomach.

She practically jumped at the touch of that hand. But...

The hand wasn't rough. It wasn't the huge, calloused hand she knew from her beatings and lessons... This hand was small and soft...

The push became harder, and it seemed to be moving, to see where to push to get Heather to move. The hand reached one of the cuts on Heather's skin and stopped.

The hand was suddenly gone.

then two other sets of hands grabbed Heather by the arms and starting lifting her up. That was when she realized that someone was talking.

"-ing her. I swear, if you have hurt Suki, I'll make you pay."

There was a gasp from beneath Heather, and she realized she was on top of someone. She opened her eyes, and looked down. The first thing she saw as her eyes began to focus, was two braids sprawled across the oddly black ground. The braids were alternating strands of black, purple and some bright blue color that she could not place on any kind of people she knew of. Not even amongst the people who used magic to alter their own bodies, could she place this hair color.

Pale skin, eyes closed so Heather couldn't see them. A full mouth with a deep blue shade on her lips, not her natural coloring, since it was smeared across her face. But then she saw the girl's body, and finally saw something familiar. Leather armor, dyed black, in a cut she couldn't quite place, but it looked functional. A warrior of some kind. An adventurer, maybe? Heather almost squeed at the thought. She had dreamed, literally _dreamed_ of falling in with a group of adventurers and learning to master her magic through the experience of fighting goblins and orcs, and finding ancient artifacts from the wars that plagued Arrenestia. 

At the same time that she was just coming to terms with the idea that she was falling in with adventurers, the two girls who were pulling her up off the girl on the ground, had gotten her far enough off of their friend that they let go of her to land on her butt. She could feel small rocks and some kind of grit like sand in the soft flesh of her butt, but considering some of the other, far more... interesting... things her parents have forced her to sit in, this was really just a minor inconvenience.

The girl laying on the ground sucked in a breath. Then she let out a moan. She started sitting up, but stopped when she opened her eyes and saw exactly what had knocked her down to begin with. With one look up and down, the girl's eyes widened in surprise. Then she spoke, and Heather felt flutters in her heart.

"Three questions. Who the hell are you, why are you naked, and what the fuck was that light?"

The flutters died as she heard the tone in the young woman's voice. Then she processed the question, and realizes that she doesn't know about magic, but that can't be right, can it? Every adventurer knows about magic. Everyone knows about magic.

And she said so.

The girl on her right side yanked Heather's head around and pulled a large, rectanglular object out. Suddenly, a bright light appeared on the top of the rectangle, and she shone it, first into one of Heather's eyes and then the other. "You don't seem to have a concussion, your pupils dilated the way they are supposed to, but something must have gotten knocked loose. Magic doesn't exist, so you must have knocked something loose in your head."

"But, Wenona..." the girl on Heather's other side said. "That light..."

"Yeah," the girl on the ground said, as she started to push herself back up. "I'd like to know what the hell that light was myself."

"It was a spell I was casting. It was supposed to take me to my new teacher's sanctum. But my father... interfered... and when his sword intersected the circle, it must have altered the flows of magic completely. I don't know how."

The last of the girls, the one who hadn't said anything yet, turned around, and picked something up from the ground. "Wait, so you mean, this is a _real_ sword?"

"Yes. Can I have it back please?"

As soon as Heather's hand touched the leather and gold wrapped hilt of the Lord Harrington's sword, purple lightning shot out from her fingers and started shooting up and down the blade. The wind picked up and began to howl. A large purple circle began drawing itself on the ground, the runes flaring menacingly as they carved themselves in the black ground.

Heather could only stare as the spell flared back into being, unbidden and uncalled. She had no idea how to stop the spell. And before she could even think to try and do something, she felt herself beginning to fall.

One of the four girls had the time to exlcaim, 'What the f-," before they were all sucked into the black nothingness of the void between worlds.


	7. A Whole New Whole New World

Suki could feel her insides twisting. She could feel colors. She was unsure of how she could see anything, because everything was pitch black. But she could see what was happening.

And so, she was screaming. She didn't know how she knew she was screaming, because she currently could see her own warped face and could see that she had no mouth.

But she screamed. She was tasting words, and she thought, for just one second, that she had lost one of her arms, watching it tear away from her body. Her body continued to warp and bend and twist in ways that went so far beyond what any sane person would consider normal, that she thought she would never be okay again.

And then the lightning came again. Jagged bolts of scarlet and violet light that seared into her. Burned her to her bones, and then kept burning. Arcs of electricity were shooting up and down what she had left of her body. And Suki had no mouth, but she screamed all the same.

And then pain. The hard pain of an impact. Against something metal. She felt glass break under her costume. She moaned, reveling in the familiar feeling of sound coming from where it was supposed to be coming from.

She opened her eyes.

She was looking at the van.

“What the fuck!” Wenona exclaimed.

“What in the actual fuck was that!”

Suki, pulling herself off the van, and then realizing she had landed on top of the vehicle, which had landed on its side, slid down the roof to the ground. When she got to the ground, she tested her legs and found she had the strength to stand. They wobbled though, as she made her way over to where her friends had landed.

“Yeah,” she said, her voice betraying her fear. She looked around at the trees. A forest somewhere. they seem to have landed on some kind of path, because there was a worn spot between the trees that they could at least follow. Someone must live nearby.

“I would like to know what that was myself. And who you are,” she said to the naked girl on the ground.

The naked girl groaned as she stood up. Or tried to. She looked to be in really bad shape. She was bruised and bleeding.

_And still, she’s pretty hot too, going by what I can see under the bruises and blood._

Suki shook herself. _No! No time for that! We have to figure out where we are and how to get home._

“Uhhhh... Yeah. Hi,” the girl on the ground said. “I’m Heather. Heather Harrington. Daughter of Lord Harrington, and heir to the Harrington Estates. I am also a wizard.”

"Not a very good one, it seems," Wenona said, more than a little snark in her voice. "But that's not possible. There's no such thing as wizards or magic."

Hazel nodded in agreement. "True. But then again. Look at what just happened to us. A hole just _opened in the middle of the air_ and a naked girl popped out of it."

She then pointed at the van. "And then another hole opened up, and we all fell into it, along with Old Rusty here."

"So?" Wenona retorted. "That doesn't mean its magic. Look at Thor, or Star Trek. _"Any technology, sufficiently developed, is indistinguishable from magic."_ Heinlein. She isn't a wizard. Just a girl with technology she can't control."

"No, that isn't right at all! Magic is a fundamental force of the plane! Only a few can attune to it, and fewer still can develop even a rudimentary control over it!"

"Well," Wenona said, her voice dripping with sarcasm, "Looks like you aren't one of those few."

"Wenona!" Hazel yelled. "Look what you've done! You've gone and made her cry, the poor thing."

And so, it seemed, Wenona had, because Heather had slumped down to the ground, her body shaking with sobs she was trying to keep in. And it looked like she was going to lose control over it, based on the sniffling sounds Suki could hear coming from the naked girl. Somewhere amongst the sobs she thought she could make out the words 'failure,' 'never work again,' and 'Jenna.'

"Damnit, Wenona," Suki said, sighing as she pinched the bridge of her nose in her first two fingers. "Regardless of what she is, or what she says she is, she is the only one of us who can figure out how to get us out of... wherever this is."

Suki looked around, trying to figure out where they were herself. It _was_ a forest of some kind, though she couldn't recognize any of the trees. _But then again_ , she thought glumly, _I grew up in Tokyo._ She probably couldn't even name ten different trees if she tried. And then she did. She gave up at six, when she couldn't recall if the next tree she thought of was related to one of the ones she had already said.

"We need to figure out where we are, and how to get somewhere less foresty," Suki said, taking charge of everyone. And the three other girls of Valkyrie went along with it, since it was her band after all. She formed it, held the auditions herself. Picked the three of them from the hundreds of people who tried out for the band. But ultimately, this was who she picked. Wenona, Hazel, and Bianca. The four of them together, making something bigger than any of them could achieve alone. Or rather, what they might achieve, once they got their stuff together and started playing like professionals, and not scared girls at the school talent show. Once they got that under control? 

Valkyrie would take the world by storm.

_But none of that can happen if we don't get home soon. So, let's get started!_

"Well," Suki said, as she starts climbing back on top of the overturned van.

"We can-at-least-get-" she grunts between each word as she tugs on the sliding door of the van, trying to open it against gravity and whatever damage there may have been to the mechanisms. "Our-stuff-ouoOO!"

Her grunted word turns into a sudden shriek of alarm as a massive tree branch shot out of the darkened woods, and snared the singer around her waist, starting to drag her deeper into the forest.


	8. Polly

Suki was screaming as the vines dragged her off into the woods.

The other girls were just standing there, with dumb looks on their faces. _Honestly. Haven't they ever seen a man eating plant before?_

Heather's mind may not have been focused enough to recall magic right then, but there was something that she knew she could do. She lept to her feet, grabbed her father's sword off the ground, and sprinted off into the woods after Suki. At least, the screaming made it easy enough to follow her through the dark woods. Swinging the sword at more vines that crept toward the naked Heather, she kept running forward, leaving a trail of dead and dying vegetation in her wake.

She wasn't sure how far she had run into the woods, or even which way she had come. In her desperate chase, she lost track of the twists and curves she had followed. Suki screamed again, and Heather shouted back at her, "Hang on! I'm coming!"

And she was. until a vine tripped her. As she fell, she felt the sword fly from her hand, and she tried to keep track of it so she could run and grab it when she got back up. She slid across the dead leaves on the ground, and came to a stop in the dirt a few feet later.

She had risen to one knee when the first vine slithered past her and wrapped around her ankle, pulling her back to the ground. Heather looked frantically for her father's sword and saw it, just out of reach. she scrambled for it, but the vine kept pulling her backward. And she just couldn't scrabble fast or hard enough to get the distance she needed to grab the sword. More vines reached out and grabbed her by the other ankle. They pulled her legs apart. A vine wrapped around each of her wrists. Heather struggles against the vines. But it was in vain, she just couldn't break herself free.

Her scream reached out to mingle with Suki's, echoing it. She heard her own panicked despair in the scream. Until the vine cut off her scream by gagging her mouth. In fact, it wrapped around her throat so tightly that she began to choke.

She felt the vine slithering its way up her thigh, climbing higher on her leg. She felt it becoming thicker. Heavier. She knew what was going to happen. She didn't want it too.

SHE. DIDN'T WANT. IT. TOO.

And the forest burst into flames around her.

The vines caught fire. The dead leaves at her feet caught fire. Fire raged all around her. And as the vines holding her in midair burned away, she found herself falling. Falling down, into the fire.

A fire that didn't burn her. A fire that lept up and caressed her face, its licking tendrils of flame almost caressing her as they came into being, lived, and died, all in the span of the same heartbeat. And as suddenly as it started, it was over. The fire was gone. Heather blinked, as though expecting it to be a dream she had about being strong. She expected to find the vine still on her throat, choking the life out of her as the vines had their way with her.

She opened her eyes.

Heather was on her feet, and the vines truly were ash. With relief, she let out a massive sigh.

Suki screamed in the distance, and snapped Heather back to the present. She looked around at the ground, hunting for the sword. She spotted a glittering silver light coming from a pile of ash. Running to it, she found the sword where it had fallen when the vines snatched her up.

She grabbed the blade by the hilt, and as she did so, a bluish fame sprung from her hands and curled up the blade, emitting a warmth and enough light to see into the lengthening shadows.

 _Wizards aren't real, are they?_ Heather thoght as she resumed her run into the forest, chasing after Suki's screams.

_Guess I just have to prove that wrong..._


End file.
